Another successful Art Week at May Street Elementary! Art Week is just what it sounds like. A whole week when the entire school is devoted to ART! Six artists are hired and many parents volunteer to teach crafts all week to the entire student population. This year I decided to have the students make recycled art journals from discarded hardbound books.
I spent a couple of weeks searching through my local libraries discarded books and also talked to local used books stores for donations. I was able to collect around 100 books and only spent $2.50! Thank you Artifacts in Hood River, Oregon and The Book Peddler in White Salmon, Washington for your donations.
I painted the cover of each book with chalkboard paint and had the kids decorate the covers with colored pencils and metallic Sharpies.
I had never kept an art journal before preparing for this week, but after doing extensive research, I decided that it was a great idea! Giving myself a couple of minutes each day to create is exactly what I need and modeling that to my kids is an added bonus.
I lead the students though a variety of projects to get their creative juices flowing each day and then allowed them time and access to materials to create whatever they wanted in their journals.
